Festival diary: The blood-spattered gig theatre and audience behaviour warning that divided the room

There was a palpable buzz at the home of the Edinburgh International Festival (EIF) for the opening night of its intimate concert series.

The Hub was full to capacity, fully reinvented for the second year as a late-night music sessions venue drawing on some of the finest talent appearing across the programme and full of anticipation at the prospect of EIF director Nicola Benedetti performing.

Violinist Greg Lawson, conductor with the Grit Orchestra, who will appear later in the festival, was certainly buzzing when he took a call a few days earlier to ask if he would put together the First Night at The Hub finale. The picture he painted was as vivid as any of those conjured up during the previous hour of dazzling musicianship and song.

Lawson said: “I have a very strange ringtone, a kind of silly 1940s dance. At the time I got the call [from the festival], I was battling about 100 wasps who had made their way into my bathroom, dressed in all my motorbike clothes with my crash helmet on, with a large can of wasp spray and a rolled-up newspaper. 

"My phone kept going off with this ridiculous ringtone, which made me laugh so much that my visor steamed up and I had to run out the house.”

Jess Shurte/Edinburgh International Festival

Content warning pulls in the crowds

There has been quite a spectacle unfolding on stage at the Royal Lyceum in recent days thanks to Internationaal Theater Amsterdam’s much-anticipated production of Heinrich von Kleist’s epic romantic tragedy.

The EIF’s extensive content warning for the show may have had something to do with the packed house, with its promises of strobe lighting, flashing lights, loud noises, blood, nudity and sexual themes.

The show, which possibly features a greater volume of blood effects than all the other productions across the city combined, proved a bit much for several audience members in the row behind me. But it wasn’t the blood-drenched finale for the Queen of the Amazons and her Greek warrior lover Achilles, or the extended sex scene, that prompted their departure long before the end.

They appeared to have been triggered by the grungy musical element of the show, which literally took the concept of gig theatre to new heights with instruments dropping in and out of the set. Perhaps they missed the description of the show on the festival’s website as “a powerful fusion of a rock concert and an ancient tragic love story”.

A little bit of patience

Across the city, the Queen’s Hall is more used to hosting rock and roll audiences, although not so much in August, when it is one of the EIF’s main venues.

But it has still been prompted to issue a polite, but firm audience warning after rude behaviour from one audience member towards its staff at one of its first shows of the month. Posting on social media, the venue said: “We know festival time, as well as being truly wonderful, can sometimes be tiring and frustrating. This is no excuse to treat our staff with rudeness, lack of respect and aggression, which will not be tolerated. Patience, kindness and listening achieve much better results every time.”